3670. EBB to Elizabeth Clementine Kinney
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 21, 332–334.
102 Rue de Grenelle
Faubourg St Germain
Paris.
October 30– [1855] [1]
My dear Mrs Kinney
I seem to deserve that you should beat me– If you do, I wont cry out much. Indeed I was not my own woman all the time I was in London, so dreadfully buffetted by engagements were we, day & night. Also, my husband wrote to you, [2] and I would not after; because he & I differed much, and to take up a cudgel conjugally is somewhat difficult and delicate, as perhaps you know. Then I was vexed. I always happen to be vexed in London in spite of everybody’s goodnature & attentions,—but my particular star shines best, I think, in Italy, .. just as all the other stars do.
For the rest, you & my husband should have thanked me for letting you have it so beautifully your own way—especially when I kept my opinion still.
We did a great deal of business in England—that is, we saw Robert’s two volumes through the press, though they are not out yet. I hold that they will set him high—in his own place—and several critical friends who glanced over the proofs confirmed this impression. [3] As for me, dear Mrs Kinney guess how many lines I have written since I left Casa Guidi. Guess– Exactly … none. Not a word, .. not a stroke. [4] Mark from this in what a maelstrom I have been living! I mean—if I can, to do something this winter,—and to prepare press-work (for myself, this time) in the summer in England.
Ah, my dear Mrs Kinney, if I did’nt write I yet did think of you—of all you in Florence—all my friends .. sorrowfully & anxiously– Poor, poor Mr Read! [5] How we did feel deeply for him! In his letter to Miss Blagden he spoke of coming to England at once .. we understood so, & expected his arrival every month. I almost wonder how he can bear that Florence .. grown strange with his misfortunes. But God’s consolation is larger sometimes than the wound He permits. It runs over, and around.
And you never went away from Florence at the fearful cholera time? And Mr Powers did not? And the Cottrells did not? And you all sate together and told stories in Boccaccio fashion? [6] It was so?
Now I think of it I did very wrong in letting you imagine that we had no stars shining on us in London. We had Ruskin, for instance—we had Carlyle—and, above all, we had Alfred Tennyson who came down from the country, like a god, and dined with us & smoked with us, two days running, … and read “Maud.” Think of that! Read “Maud”. His reading is peculiar .. rather like chanting than reading .. and the effect lives in my ears now, as a sea-song in a shell. Mr Tennyson [7] too was among us—& pretended to like London better than I did– How I could congratulate him on being back again in Florence!–
There’s nothing like Florence, dear Mrs Kinney– I would have all you Florentines know it.
Yet this Paris is very agreeable, very beautiful, full of resources– I do confess to having a weakness for Paris– Women cant help it. Yes, and artists cant help it. If you would lend me half a sun from your Tuscany just for this next winter, I might bear with Paris for a few months at any rate.
Sir Edward Lytton is here, & he and his son gave us a very pleasant evening a day or two ago– I liked him better than I thought I should .. but not as well as Owen Meredith—indeed no!
Think of Isa Blagden. She has foully betrayed & abandoned me—and now I begin to think I shall lose her altogether this winter, & that she will hurry through France & go straight to you. She professes to have a “presentiment” against coming to Paris. She is afraid of crowds and prices, here .. and so lingers in London, to eat gold among two million inhabitants–
This letter goes to you by our friend Mr Jarves & is sure of a welcome therefore. Is dear Mr Kinney quite well? and you .. are your nerves quieted, & has your general health not suffered from so much sadness around you? And the children? and Mrs Kinney? [8] I send my love to you all. May God bless you– Write to me, if you bear no malice,—& tell me of yourself, and of what you are doing in literature, or in thought generally. My husband unites with me in the warmest wishes to you & Mr Kinney, .. & I am ever your affectionate E B Browning.
Address: À Madame / Madame Kinney / Casa del Bello. / [In lower left-hand corner:] By kindness of / Mr Jarves.
Publication: Bosco, pp. 91–93.
Manuscript: Yale University.
1. Year provided by reference to the return address.
3. W.J. Fox, John Forster, Robert Lytton, and Joseph Milsand, as indicated by RB in letter 3639.
4. EBB refers to Aurora Leigh (1857).
6. An allusion to the Decameron (1349–51) by Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–75), a set of stories supposedly told by a group of refugees from the plague in fourteenth-century Florence.
7. i.e., Frederick Tennyson.
8. Maria Kinney (née Webb, 1789–1880), widow of William Burnet Kinney’s elder brother, Thomas Talmadge Kinney (1785–1826), whom she had married in 1809. When the Kinneys travelled to Turin in 1850, they left their two daughters behind in the care of Maria. The following year she accompanied them to Turin and remained with the family.
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